University officials balk at Bush's proposed cuts

Published: Wednesday, March 02, 2005

WASHINGTON (AP) - Bush budget cuts would hit important research programs that examine everything from soybeans and dairy production to cattle viruses, agriculture school officials complained to Congress.

Fred Cholick, dean of the agriculture college at Kansas State University, said the cuts threaten the original mission of the 75 land-grant schools, which were created by Congress in the 1800s to use public money on shared agricultural research.

Under the Bush plan, funding for three programs on farming, forestry and animal health, mainstays at land-grant institutions for decades, would be slashed from $200 million this year to $100 million next year and nothing in 2007.

Some money would be available to schools through competitive grants, but school officials say the change would be so sudden that about 2,000 jobs nationwide would be lost immediately. The cuts also would destroy a network of research collaboration that allows states to work together to thwart agriculture diseases and improve practices.

"If everything goes competitive, then it's everybody for themselves," said Bobby Moser, dean and vice president of the agriculture college at Ohio State University. "We lose the network."

Moser and about 120 other school officials and agriculture research supporters fanned out across Capitol Hill to lobby their hometown lawmakers .

The schools use the money to study both national priorities - food security, pest control, obesity, waste management - and local issues, such as cattle diarrhea in Wyoming, dairy breeding in Pennsylvania and which pesticides to use at macadamia nut farms in Hawaii.

"What kind of partnerships would we have in the future?" Cholick said.

He said the network paid off last November when the first U.S. case of soybean rust, a fungus that can reduce harvests, was found in two Louisiana State University research fields. The school was able to get word immediately to researchers across the country for what to look for and how to stop the spread.

"If we don't have a network, a system, then we don't know what's here and we can't respond," Cholick said. "These formula grants are the glue that holds the system together."

Bob Steele, dean of the agricultural sciences college at Pennsylvania State University, said the cuts also would affect students and, ultimately, consumers.

"You are putting at risk an abundant food supply and an affordable food supply and a safe food supply," Steele said. "So it's not just about farmers. Anybody who eats ought to be concerned about this."

Agriculture Department spokesman Ed Loyd said the Bush administration is proposing the two-year transition to competitive funding because it would eliminate duplication.

"We believe we can attract the highest caliber scientist and also be able to focus on a lot of more critical research issues by going to a competitive grant system," Loyd said.